63,000 People Have Cancelled Their Tesla Model 3 Reservations So Far

And that's okay, Elon Musk says.

About 63,000 people have cancelled their Tesla Model 3 reservations, Elon Musk said during Tesla's quarterly earnings call this week. But the Tesla CEO doesn't seem concerned. Musk said the cancelled reservations won't make a big impact, and implied it might be better for Tesla to keep the number of reservations in check for now, according to Business Insider.

Total orders for the new electric car dropped from 518,000 to 455,000, Musk said during the earnings call.

The Tesla CEO noted that new reservations have averaged 1,800 per day since the first cars were delivered to Tesla employees in a much-publicized event last Friday, and said Tesla could increase reservations even further, if it wanted to. It makes more sense for Tesla to focus on filling the orders it has than to chase new ones, Musk said.

"It's like if you're a restaurant and you're serving hamburgers and there's like an hour-and-a-half wait for hamburgers," Musk said during the earnings call. "Do you really want to more encourage people to order more hamburgers?"

Tesla began taking reservations and $1,000 refundable deposits from customers more than a year ago. While production is now underway, many customers still have a long wait ahead before they receive their cars. Tesla aims to be producing 20,000 Model 3s a month by December—but even at that rate, lots of reservation holders won't see their cars until late next year at the earliest.

Given the sheer volume of reservations, it makes sense for Tesla to focus on building cars instead of chasing new customers. Considering the long wait times and the fact that so many people made reservations without even seeing the Model 3 in person, let alone driving it, it's also not surprising that some customers have changed their minds.